Engineers prepare holes for TNT charges on a road near Philippsbourg, December, 1944

Engineers, pressed into service as infantrymen, watch from an attic window

General Herren, commander of the 70th Division

American troops man a 57 mm anti-tank gun near Reipertswiller, January, 1945

A moment of relaxation for American troops of the 70th Division

Gun crew of 79th Division trying to keep warm, Alsace, January, 1945

A Mortar crew prepares a barrage of white phosphorus shells

A French woman and her children prepare to leave Haguenau prior to the planned withdrawal of the 7th US Army

Civilians retreat from the battle zone with what little they can save

An M4 tank passes through Wingen

Men of the 45th Division hunt for a sniper in the recently taken village of Niederbronn

Wounded infantrymen of the 70th Division shelter in a protective trench near Heideneck

Captured German soldiers under escort carry their wounded on litters

Wingen at the height of the battle: the town was lost and retaken twice, in the course of which the Americans lost about 2000 men

A sniper’s nest is knocked out

Stretcher bearers carry wounded infantrymen away from the battle

Lt Edwyn Cookes shows how he feigned death behind the enemy lines for eighteen hours. The bodies in the backgrround are genuine casualties

General Alexander Patch, Commander of the US 7th Army

‘King Jean’ – General de Lattre de Tassigny, Commander of the French 1st Army

General Leclerc, Commander of 2nd French Armoured Division. Seen here in Germany with captured Frenchmen from the SS Division Charlemagne. A few minutes after this photograph was taken, he had the renegades shot

General de Gaulle at Bayeux, Summer, 1944

General Robert Young, in the War Room at Ribeauville, briefs General de Gaulle on the situation in the Colmar Pocket

French and American troops planning a counterattack

Nuns watch men of the US 28th Infantry Division in Rouffach

German refugees from the fighting in Alsace sought shelter in disused mines

Officers of the 7th Army plan the next stage of their advance from Sarreguemines

Men of the US 12th Armoured Division on top of a camouflaged medium tank south of Colmar

A French farmer puts flowers on the body of an American soldier

This picture gives some idea of what conditions were like in Alsace in the winter of 1944/45

Across the Rhine: a white flag hangs above the ruins of a German town, March, 1945